Tabula Rasa was killed to fuel the launch of AION. It was turning a profit... but not the profit that they they expected from AION. They shut it down to re-use these resources to get AION out the door.
Tabula Rasa was backburnered as a remodel for F2P in Korea. The concern was that despite having turned a profit in the US that it wouldnt turn a profit in Asia (which is the larger market for NCSoft). So, the plug was pulled, so they could focus on AION, and then they could slowly retool the game as a F2P game and relaunch at a later date.
I have not followed up on this for Korea, but as we are starting to see other similar games (Hellgate) coming back now, I would guess that it might show up in a year or so.
You hit the nail on the head, though. We already know what kind of a hit it would be if it was renamed, given a different theme and rereleased - it's called LOTRO.
Auto Assault, EnB, Shadowbane... would really like to see any of those revived. Now... let's see how many people post that your opinion is wrong, that you have them in the wrong order or that you should've listed others.
Yeah, except LOTRO had at release working chat, a working crafting system, characters that don't look like they're ice skating over the landscape, and buildings you can actually go in to, to name a few. Yeah, it was nothing like LOTRO. I agree had it not been called AC2 it possibly may have done a little better, but it still would have died I believe because there were just too many game breaking issues.
The AC2 folks can look at it with the rosiest colored glasses they want but the truth is the game was hella broken in so many ways I felt embarrassed for Turbine(one of my favorite dev houses). Top that off with a dev team that seemed to change direction with the wind and AC2 just had no chance.
More OT:
Great list OP.
IMO Wish was the biggest disappointment on that list. I mean the game was ready for release for gods sake, then all of a sudden it was canceled. To say the people beta testing it were shocked would be a huge understatement. Maybe someday....
Einherjar_LC says: WTB the true successor to UO or Asheron's Call pst!
DDO has proven that games can switch payment models and be a success. The game sthat you listed that were closed down like TR and SB can easily be profitable for the companies owning them if done with the right model.
DDO is nowadays a success? Interesting.
Anyway, Lotro is ressurected Asheron's Call 2 as someone else already pointed out, but without the deep crafting, character customization and meaningful PvP.
HUH? I played AC2 and Lotro is nothing like it. Where in the world did you people come up with that idea? They were about as different as night and day.
LOTRO was built off of the engine and toolset that was used to create AC2. Obviously the game is different - no sense in using the engine to recreate a failed game. They upgraded and expanded the G2 engine in order to create LOTRO. That's a good thing primarily because they were able to devote more time to the world and content since the core was not only established but was one that the team had a very good familiarity with.
I believe the final engine used in LOTRO was simply named G3.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein "Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Tabula Rasa - It was a title with very high expectations but what was actually released was nothing what people expected. The zones were tiny, it skill system (forgot the name it had) was supposed to be innovative and complex but ended up being simpler than WoWs with far fewer skills. Also PvP barely existed which made the game mostly about fighting against a PvE mob army for taking over and then losing bases back and forth ad naeseum. It was a terribly boring and shallow game and its subscriber base dropped like a rock, and deservingly so.
Asherons Call 2 - Another awful game with some redeeming qualities. The number one issue many people had was that it completely lacked any NPC towns and all that there was were some ruins where you could craft and allegadly build up a town, but they never actually implemented that part which made the game completely pointless.
Also it was a sequel to Asherons Call, which had a skillbased system, crafting and magic system which was quite complex. Yet Asherons Call 2 was a severly dumbed down WoW version of skills, pitiful. This was quite odd as WoW had not been released yet, but still the game had a skill system that was quite similar to WoW (except more simple).
Originally posted by brostyn AC2 and SB failed for a reason.
Why should they be resurrected without some major changes? They would just fail again.
AC2 was god awful. I was super hyped about it, and bought it on day one. I cancelled a few weeks later. SB had some great ideas, but failed to implement them properly.
Do I know the secret formula to fix them? No. I do know they failed, because not many people found the games worth playing.
And I know If the game AC2 would have released at this day and age it would basically be a carbon copy of most of them casual friendly games of today, only AC2 was FIRST at this when it actually was released. I do not think players where ready for this at that time..Only a a year later WoW was released, and we all know how that went..
There is alot of reasons a game can fail upon , and In the end AC2 was absolutly a blast to play, but with the negative start and so on, it never gained enough population to keep it floating..But a bad game, NOT A CHANCE..
And there was NO HYPE around AC2, maybe for some AC players, but they were also one reason it failed , because it was so diffrent from AC
People forget that a sequel to UO was in development TWICE! The first one the radically better of the 2 in my opinion! The damned money-men managed to murder not 1 but 2 sequels!
I would personally love a -new- sequel to AC, not a resurrection of the last one, but a real upgrade of the original. Mostly a major graphical upgrade keeping the core mechanics/systems as they were, not the radical changes of the dead sequel.
Westwood Studios closing was the biggest wound on that thread for me. Command and Conquer was such an amazing RTS series. And then EA bought out Westwood Studios, and then C&C turned into a joke of an RTS for the rest of history.
AC2s had a few problems, like Microsoft forcing it out the door too fast, chat system issues, bugs, lack of vision etc. But the biggest issue was that they didn't take all that engine work and graphics improvement and just apply it to a rerelease of AC to keep the game current. Instead they never upgraded AC's engine and made a product completely different (although influential to say the least, look at the resemblences of MMOs now).
I just wanted to point out that Tabula Rasa is Garriott's third MMO: Ultima Online, Lineage and Tabula Rasa.
Richard Garriot didnt develop lineage. He moved to work for NCSoft before forming Destination Games and played as Lord British in Lineage1 while participating on running it.
Garriot was the producer of Ultima Online and the executive producer of Lineage and Lineage 2. He and Starr founded Destination Games prior to his partnership with NCSoft.
Earth and Beyond FTW !!! I am one of those players that will tell you it was a hoot in it's day and ahead of its time for sure, I beta tested Auto Assualt, it was ok, but I always felt it would not last same with TR, Wish I was beta testing also, I do remember it having allot of issues, but most new games do, but it was coming along..
AC 2 was a solid game in my opinion, better than Lotro. It suffered from horrible launch and dev's inability to fix things fast properly. Let's not forget Microsoft was involved in AC2 , just like they were involved in games like Mythica or Vanguard - which they abandonded to fund at certain stage. And I'm sure there's more examples where Microsoft was involved in game that ended up either as a vaporware or became an instant failure right after release.
You could probably insert the entirety of auto assault into a "traditional" post apocolypse scifi MMORPG and make both more replayable/fun.
Wish died in part because of the hardware requirements but also because the network code didn't lend itself to all players on one shard. If they had split the world after all of the promises to be one shard the game would have been panned.
AC2 was rather good. It could easily compete with WoW on its gameplay. Unfortunately, not enough people played it to find out.
There are a number of MUDs I'd like to see brought to a 3d MMO. There are so many great gameplay ideas out there that simply won't come to light because everyone wants to be a WoW clone. Problem is, cloning WoW won't get you subscribers - you have to be better and/or different than WoW to lure all those juicy subscriber dollars. More of the same just means people will stick with WoW and you'll fail.
Planetside was/is a lot of fun...for awhile. Since the world doesn't change in response to your wins/losses it gets old fairly quickly. I'd like to see that game remade with some new ideas to make it more replayable.
I think a Mechwarrior style MMO would be awesome. Guild missions to different instanced planets where you could actually see your progress as you conquered or were driven off planet would be awesome. Rival guilds could sign up to fight you in your instance for PVP style action. It could be a really cool game, but probably will never be built that way.
Played Earth and Beyond from launch until the day the pulled the plug on the servers(Sunset). Had some good times and bad times as with any MMO. The best thing about that game was the community. People would go out of their way just to help somebody else. I miss my 150 Jenquai Defender and destroying the tengu in the fishbowl, and who could forget the commercials in-station.... BIG! STRONG! WOW!... TADA-O!....tada-o *kids giggle*
My word and world holds ground and is real Your word is like floods of poisoned water A language spoken with spit from different tongues More of my unwanted opinions
DDO has proven that games can switch payment models and be a success. The game sthat you listed that were closed down like TR and SB can easily be profitable for the companies owning them if done with the right model.
DDO is nowadays a success? Interesting.
Anyway, Lotro is ressurected Asheron's Call 2 as someone else already pointed out, but without the deep crafting, character customization and meaningful PvP.
DDO is a massive hit with its new payment model. Check some more favorable f2p mmo sites its winning awards everywhere. more content is being released for DDO now than when it was failing as a p2p.
Wish put a lot of stuff in the client...perhaps it ended up being too much stuff that would have lead to exploits and recoding the game to fix them would have been too much money so they scrapped it (just guessing but from my experience with the beta I think this is what happened /// or they just ran out of cash)
The game had some economy problems (Npcs would run out of money and not buy items from players....) The idea was that everything in the economy would be created by players who would sell items to npcs the nthe npcs would turn around and sell them again to the players that needed them.
UO2 would rule BUT now that Mythic are doing the UO updates...well after WAR I just dunno
Auto Assault was HORRIBLE. Don't bring that turd back. Dang.
Gods and Heroes should be resurrected. I hear it might be and hope this is the case.
Tabula Rasa had some nice things about it. But what to me was bizarre wasn't the game design decisions, but the fact that, as I recall, there was no long hair for girls. WTF. I guess it's a personal thing...somewhere in my male brain I equate long hair with female and short hair with male. Narrow minded I guess. But I like to have an attractive female avatar and if there is no long hair or decent long hair styles for women...well that's just basic. If that isn't in there, then there are a million other things the developers didn't think of.
Ultima Online 2 sounds intriguing since I missed the original.
Um ya AA just needs to stay dead. Its the only MMO I betaed that I simple could not bring myself to play long enough to exit the tutorial.
AC2 had issues and absolutely needs to come back. No more MS passport systems crippling communications, mature engine. It was a great game despite its issues and really has gone untouched for original design. And yes DDO and LotRO are AC2 reskinned.
Oh and UO:Origins should have come out. It looked awesome and had so much hype behind it. Anyone else remember the motion capture videos? Jaw dropping. UO2 also looked good but much less ahh factor that many years later.
Originally posted by Perkunas Played Earth and Beyond from launch until the day the pulled the plug on the servers(Sunset). Had some good times and bad times as with any MMO. The best thing about that game was the community. People would go out of their way just to help somebody else. I miss my 150 Jenquai Defender and destroying the tengu in the fishbowl, and who could forget the commercials in-station.... BIG! STRONG! WOW!... TADA-O!....tada-o *kids giggle*
Pretty much Ditto across the board. I am afraid that i refused to give EA any more money after the announcement and do regret not being there for the parties at sunset and i miss this game a lot.
Tried to get in to EvE as an alternative (as a lot of people did) and although it is a great game in it's own right, it just didn't push the same buttons at all. As you said, the community was everything and there was never a problem finding a group and people would go out of their way to jump you around, a great blend of pretty well balanced classes and great community that i have been hard pressed to find since (
It must be Thursday, i never could get the hang of Thursdays.
I just wanted to point out that Tabula Rasa is Garriott's third MMO: Ultima Online, Lineage and Tabula Rasa.
Richard Garriot didnt develop lineage. He moved to work for NCSoft before forming Destination Games and played as Lord British in Lineage1 while participating on running it.
Garriot was the producer of Ultima Online and the executive producer of Lineage and Lineage 2. He and Starr founded Destination Games prior to his partnership with NCSoft.
Other than in name, Richard Garriot had very little to do with the development of Lineage 1 (none in fact) and Lineage 2.
Back on topic, I'd like to see Shadowbane fleshed out more and re-released, (EMU doesn't cut it) and UO deserves a worthy sequel.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I would love to see an analysis of UO's long line of failed attempts to move towards a sequel (or at least to a new engine), combined with a comparison to the strategies of EQ (through EQ2) and Runequest to modernize. I just don't know enough about these games to really compare them, but I know there's an important story to tell.
The fundemental question of sequel is how do you transition the existing game/player base/loyalties. Just because you create a new game and slap the title "UO2" on it doesn't mean the game will actually succeed ... gameplay still trumps IP once the hype dies down, especially if people are losing all their years of accumulated experience and trinkets. And just because to introduce a new client, doesn't mean people will move to it - people are very sensitive to the tiniest tweaks. Both paths can leave you in the nightmare limbo of two independent engines in need of support - or even more catastrophically, a player base that becomes actively skeptical of your future efforts.
What makes me most skeptical about a UO2 is that the original UO has not been able to maintain focus on a vision/fiction - plans bogged down in endless delays, are left half-finished or have dubious consistency with the spirit of the game. Every time there are hints of revival, a corporate reorg happens and everything collapsed. Whatever the causes of the chaos, the problems run deeper than the engine.
Oh how I wish Tabula Rasa would see the light of day again...
Everytime I quit a current MMO, I always go looking through all my old games, and i always find the TR case.
I flip through the big ass manual for it, and look at the game discs and pack it away again.
Its the only game I can honestly say I would still jump in and play for a month here or there if I could. TR wasnt the best game ever, in fact it had a shit load of problems. But It was one of the best gaming experiances I ever had.
RIP TR and SWG.
Agree. I really couldn't understand why TR was cancelled. It seemed populated, had no trouble finding parties for whatever. I am usually skeptical of such things but here i fully believe the drama and conspiracies.
"Never met a pack of humans that were any different. Look at the idiots that get elected every couple of years. You really consider those guys more mature than us? The only difference between us and them is, when they gank some noobs and take their stuff, the noobs actually die." - Madimorga
Played Earth and Beyond from launch until the day the pulled the plug on the servers(Sunset). Had some good times and bad times as with any MMO. The best thing about that game was the community. People would go out of their way just to help somebody else. I miss my 150 Jenquai Defender and destroying the tengu in the fishbowl, and who could forget the commercials in-station.... BIG! STRONG! WOW!... TADA-O!....tada-o *kids giggle*
Pretty much Ditto across the board. I am afraid that i refused to give EA any more money after the announcement and do regret not being there for the parties at sunset and i miss this game a lot.
Tried to get in to EvE as an alternative (as a lot of people did) and although it is a great game in it's own right, it just didn't push the same buttons at all. As you said, the community was everything and there was never a problem finding a group and people would go out of their way to jump you around, a great blend of pretty well balanced classes and great community that i have been hard pressed to find since (
Followed the same path as you. Played EnB from start to finish and then ended up in EVE, for 5 years, afterward. I would love to see Earth & Beyond resurrected and upgraded.
Comments
Tabula Rasa was killed to fuel the launch of AION. It was turning a profit... but not the profit that they they expected from AION. They shut it down to re-use these resources to get AION out the door.
Tabula Rasa was backburnered as a remodel for F2P in Korea. The concern was that despite having turned a profit in the US that it wouldnt turn a profit in Asia (which is the larger market for NCSoft). So, the plug was pulled, so they could focus on AION, and then they could slowly retool the game as a F2P game and relaunch at a later date.
I have not followed up on this for Korea, but as we are starting to see other similar games (Hellgate) coming back now, I would guess that it might show up in a year or so.
Yeah, except LOTRO had at release working chat, a working crafting system, characters that don't look like they're ice skating over the landscape, and buildings you can actually go in to, to name a few. Yeah, it was nothing like LOTRO. I agree had it not been called AC2 it possibly may have done a little better, but it still would have died I believe because there were just too many game breaking issues.
The AC2 folks can look at it with the rosiest colored glasses they want but the truth is the game was hella broken in so many ways I felt embarrassed for Turbine(one of my favorite dev houses). Top that off with a dev team that seemed to change direction with the wind and AC2 just had no chance.
More OT:
Great list OP.
IMO Wish was the biggest disappointment on that list. I mean the game was ready for release for gods sake, then all of a sudden it was canceled. To say the people beta testing it were shocked would be a huge understatement. Maybe someday....
Einherjar_LC says: WTB the true successor to UO or Asheron's Call pst!
DDO is nowadays a success? Interesting.
Anyway, Lotro is ressurected Asheron's Call 2 as someone else already pointed out, but without the deep crafting, character customization and meaningful PvP.
HUH? I played AC2 and Lotro is nothing like it. Where in the world did you people come up with that idea? They were about as different as night and day.
LOTRO was built off of the engine and toolset that was used to create AC2. Obviously the game is different - no sense in using the engine to recreate a failed game. They upgraded and expanded the G2 engine in order to create LOTRO. That's a good thing primarily because they were able to devote more time to the world and content since the core was not only established but was one that the team had a very good familiarity with.
I believe the final engine used in LOTRO was simply named G3.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
I agree with most of your list except these two:
Tabula Rasa - It was a title with very high expectations but what was actually released was nothing what people expected. The zones were tiny, it skill system (forgot the name it had) was supposed to be innovative and complex but ended up being simpler than WoWs with far fewer skills. Also PvP barely existed which made the game mostly about fighting against a PvE mob army for taking over and then losing bases back and forth ad naeseum. It was a terribly boring and shallow game and its subscriber base dropped like a rock, and deservingly so.
Asherons Call 2 - Another awful game with some redeeming qualities. The number one issue many people had was that it completely lacked any NPC towns and all that there was were some ruins where you could craft and allegadly build up a town, but they never actually implemented that part which made the game completely pointless.
Also it was a sequel to Asherons Call, which had a skillbased system, crafting and magic system which was quite complex. Yet Asherons Call 2 was a severly dumbed down WoW version of skills, pitiful. This was quite odd as WoW had not been released yet, but still the game had a skill system that was quite similar to WoW (except more simple).
My gaming blog
And I know If the game AC2 would have released at this day and age it would basically be a carbon copy of most of them casual friendly games of today, only AC2 was FIRST at this when it actually was released. I do not think players where ready for this at that time..Only a a year later WoW was released, and we all know how that went..
There is alot of reasons a game can fail upon , and In the end AC2 was absolutly a blast to play, but with the negative start and so on, it never gained enough population to keep it floating..But a bad game, NOT A CHANCE..
And there was NO HYPE around AC2, maybe for some AC players, but they were also one reason it failed , because it was so diffrent from AC
People forget that a sequel to UO was in development TWICE! The first one the radically better of the 2 in my opinion! The damned money-men managed to murder not 1 but 2 sequels!
I would personally love a -new- sequel to AC, not a resurrection of the last one, but a real upgrade of the original. Mostly a major graphical upgrade keeping the core mechanics/systems as they were, not the radical changes of the dead sequel.
NCSoft and EA are rather disturbing companies.
Does anybody know how far Dune was when it was cancelled?
Westwood Studios closing was the biggest wound on that thread for me. Command and Conquer was such an amazing RTS series. And then EA bought out Westwood Studios, and then C&C turned into a joke of an RTS for the rest of history.
AC2s had a few problems, like Microsoft forcing it out the door too fast, chat system issues, bugs, lack of vision etc. But the biggest issue was that they didn't take all that engine work and graphics improvement and just apply it to a rerelease of AC to keep the game current. Instead they never upgraded AC's engine and made a product completely different (although influential to say the least, look at the resemblences of MMOs now).
Richard Garriot didnt develop lineage. He moved to work for NCSoft before forming Destination Games and played as Lord British in Lineage1 while participating on running it.
Garriot was the producer of Ultima Online and the executive producer of Lineage and Lineage 2. He and Starr founded Destination Games prior to his partnership with NCSoft.
Earth and Beyond FTW !!! I am one of those players that will tell you it was a hoot in it's day and ahead of its time for sure, I beta tested Auto Assualt, it was ok, but I always felt it would not last same with TR, Wish I was beta testing also, I do remember it having allot of issues, but most new games do, but it was coming along..
AC 2 was a solid game in my opinion, better than Lotro. It suffered from horrible launch and dev's inability to fix things fast properly. Let's not forget Microsoft was involved in AC2 , just like they were involved in games like Mythica or Vanguard - which they abandonded to fund at certain stage. And I'm sure there's more examples where Microsoft was involved in game that ended up either as a vaporware or became an instant failure right after release.
REALITY CHECK
I would have to add Motor City Online to this list. It was really a great game and brought a whole new fold of people into the MMO world.
You could probably insert the entirety of auto assault into a "traditional" post apocolypse scifi MMORPG and make both more replayable/fun.
Wish died in part because of the hardware requirements but also because the network code didn't lend itself to all players on one shard. If they had split the world after all of the promises to be one shard the game would have been panned.
AC2 was rather good. It could easily compete with WoW on its gameplay. Unfortunately, not enough people played it to find out.
There are a number of MUDs I'd like to see brought to a 3d MMO. There are so many great gameplay ideas out there that simply won't come to light because everyone wants to be a WoW clone. Problem is, cloning WoW won't get you subscribers - you have to be better and/or different than WoW to lure all those juicy subscriber dollars. More of the same just means people will stick with WoW and you'll fail.
Planetside was/is a lot of fun...for awhile. Since the world doesn't change in response to your wins/losses it gets old fairly quickly. I'd like to see that game remade with some new ideas to make it more replayable.
I think a Mechwarrior style MMO would be awesome. Guild missions to different instanced planets where you could actually see your progress as you conquered or were driven off planet would be awesome. Rival guilds could sign up to fight you in your instance for PVP style action. It could be a really cool game, but probably will never be built that way.
Played Earth and Beyond from launch until the day the pulled the plug on the servers(Sunset). Had some good times and bad times as with any MMO. The best thing about that game was the community. People would go out of their way just to help somebody else. I miss my 150 Jenquai Defender and destroying the tengu in the fishbowl, and who could forget the commercials in-station.... BIG! STRONG! WOW!... TADA-O!....tada-o *kids giggle*
My word and world holds ground and is real
Your word is like floods of poisoned water
A language spoken with spit from different tongues
More of my unwanted opinions
DDO is nowadays a success? Interesting.
Anyway, Lotro is ressurected Asheron's Call 2 as someone else already pointed out, but without the deep crafting, character customization and meaningful PvP.
DDO is a massive hit with its new payment model. Check some more favorable f2p mmo sites its winning awards everywhere. more content is being released for DDO now than when it was failing as a p2p.
Why couldn't SB and TR do the same?
Playing: Rift, LotRO
Waiting on: GW2, BP
didn't you guys already make a list like this not to long ago, why you keep redoing your own articles all the time its getting old
I loved Wish +1 for that
Wish put a lot of stuff in the client...perhaps it ended up being too much stuff that would have lead to exploits and recoding the game to fix them would have been too much money so they scrapped it (just guessing but from my experience with the beta I think this is what happened /// or they just ran out of cash)
The game had some economy problems (Npcs would run out of money and not buy items from players....) The idea was that everything in the economy would be created by players who would sell items to npcs the nthe npcs would turn around and sell them again to the players that needed them.
UO2 would rule BUT now that Mythic are doing the UO updates...well after WAR I just dunno
Precu SWG should be resurrected.
Auto Assault was HORRIBLE. Don't bring that turd back. Dang.
Gods and Heroes should be resurrected. I hear it might be and hope this is the case.
Tabula Rasa had some nice things about it. But what to me was bizarre wasn't the game design decisions, but the fact that, as I recall, there was no long hair for girls. WTF. I guess it's a personal thing...somewhere in my male brain I equate long hair with female and short hair with male. Narrow minded I guess. But I like to have an attractive female avatar and if there is no long hair or decent long hair styles for women...well that's just basic. If that isn't in there, then there are a million other things the developers didn't think of.
Ultima Online 2 sounds intriguing since I missed the original.
Um ya AA just needs to stay dead. Its the only MMO I betaed that I simple could not bring myself to play long enough to exit the tutorial.
AC2 had issues and absolutely needs to come back. No more MS passport systems crippling communications, mature engine. It was a great game despite its issues and really has gone untouched for original design. And yes DDO and LotRO are AC2 reskinned.
Oh and UO:Origins should have come out. It looked awesome and had so much hype behind it. Anyone else remember the motion capture videos? Jaw dropping. UO2 also looked good but much less ahh factor that many years later.
Pretty much Ditto across the board. I am afraid that i refused to give EA any more money after the announcement and do regret not being there for the parties at sunset and i miss this game a lot.
Tried to get in to EvE as an alternative (as a lot of people did) and although it is a great game in it's own right, it just didn't push the same buttons at all. As you said, the community was everything and there was never a problem finding a group and people would go out of their way to jump you around, a great blend of pretty well balanced classes and great community that i have been hard pressed to find since (
It must be Thursday, i never could get the hang of Thursdays.
Richard Garriot didnt develop lineage. He moved to work for NCSoft before forming Destination Games and played as Lord British in Lineage1 while participating on running it.
Garriot was the producer of Ultima Online and the executive producer of Lineage and Lineage 2. He and Starr founded Destination Games prior to his partnership with NCSoft.
Other than in name, Richard Garriot had very little to do with the development of Lineage 1 (none in fact) and Lineage 2.
Back on topic, I'd like to see Shadowbane fleshed out more and re-released, (EMU doesn't cut it) and UO deserves a worthy sequel.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I would love to see an analysis of UO's long line of failed attempts to move towards a sequel (or at least to a new engine), combined with a comparison to the strategies of EQ (through EQ2) and Runequest to modernize. I just don't know enough about these games to really compare them, but I know there's an important story to tell.
The fundemental question of sequel is how do you transition the existing game/player base/loyalties. Just because you create a new game and slap the title "UO2" on it doesn't mean the game will actually succeed ... gameplay still trumps IP once the hype dies down, especially if people are losing all their years of accumulated experience and trinkets. And just because to introduce a new client, doesn't mean people will move to it - people are very sensitive to the tiniest tweaks. Both paths can leave you in the nightmare limbo of two independent engines in need of support - or even more catastrophically, a player base that becomes actively skeptical of your future efforts.
What makes me most skeptical about a UO2 is that the original UO has not been able to maintain focus on a vision/fiction - plans bogged down in endless delays, are left half-finished or have dubious consistency with the spirit of the game. Every time there are hints of revival, a corporate reorg happens and everything collapsed. Whatever the causes of the chaos, the problems run deeper than the engine.
Everytime I quit a current MMO, I always go looking through all my old games, and i always find the TR case.
I flip through the big ass manual for it, and look at the game discs and pack it away again.
Its the only game I can honestly say I would still jump in and play for a month here or there if I could. TR wasnt the best game ever, in fact it had a shit load of problems. But It was one of the best gaming experiances I ever had.
RIP TR and SWG.
Agree. I really couldn't understand why TR was cancelled. It seemed populated, had no trouble finding parties for whatever. I am usually skeptical of such things but here i fully believe the drama and conspiracies.
"Never met a pack of humans that were any different. Look at the idiots that get elected every couple of years. You really consider those guys more mature than us? The only difference between us and them is, when they gank some noobs and take their stuff, the noobs actually die." - Madimorga
Pretty much Ditto across the board. I am afraid that i refused to give EA any more money after the announcement and do regret not being there for the parties at sunset and i miss this game a lot.
Tried to get in to EvE as an alternative (as a lot of people did) and although it is a great game in it's own right, it just didn't push the same buttons at all. As you said, the community was everything and there was never a problem finding a group and people would go out of their way to jump you around, a great blend of pretty well balanced classes and great community that i have been hard pressed to find since (
Followed the same path as you. Played EnB from start to finish and then ended up in EVE, for 5 years, afterward. I would love to see Earth & Beyond resurrected and upgraded.
I can't believe you missed Neocron.